Global insight

US$1.2bn alarm bell for air cargo price-fixers

A US class-action lawsuit alleging grand-scale air cargo price-fixing collusion, which has so far led to more than US$1.2bn in voluntary settlements, sends a strong message to the industry, a top specialist competition law firm has admitted to aircargoeye.com.

In the New York case, 28 major world airlines have now chosen to settle out of court. All of the carriers in the case have denied any wrongdoing.

The complex air cargo litigation is one of Hausfeld’s largest and longest-running price-fixing cases.

Others include a vitamin C class-action resulting in a judgment of $162m following a trial and, in another, $2bn of settlements reached in a foreign exchange benchmark rates antitrust argument.

“The air cargo class-action should send a message to all businesses, including those operating in the air cargo industry, that private enforcement of the anti-trust laws is important, that those who violate the law will be held accountable, and that victims of anti-competitive conduct have a means to recover for the damages they suffer,” a statement from Hausfeld warns.

Below is a top-10 list of the biggest settlement payments in the New York air cargo price-fixing litigation to-date:

Defendant

Settlement (US$)

Korean Air

115m

Polar Air Cargo/Atlas AirWorldwide Holdings

100m

EVA Air

99m

Singapore Airlines

92.49m

China Airlines

90m

British Airways

89.5m

Air France/KLM/Martinair

87m

Lufthansa

85m

Lan/ABSA

66m

Cathay Pacific

65m

Related Articles

THE partnership between Oman Air and freighter airline Cargolux, launched in April 2015, introduced a second weekly frequency to Chennai from 11th August 2015. The addition of Chennai to the Oman Air Cargolux network is the cooperation’s latest step in expanding its airfreight services from Oman to India, says Cargolux[…]